Letters -- Published Sept. 12, 2013

Thursday

Sep 12, 2013 at 12:01 AM

Having just returned from the Santa Ana to San Juan Capistrano area, I was alarmed at how green the urban sprawl was, with lush landscaping and expansive boulevards, parkways and freeways with manicured lawns and trees lining these roadways. Of course, the rolling hills outside of the urban centers are a landscape of dry and rocky chaparral.

Having just returned from the Santa Ana to San Juan Capistrano area, I was alarmed at how green the urban sprawl was, with lush landscaping and expansive boulevards, parkways and freeways with manicured lawns and trees lining these roadways. Of course, the rolling hills outside of the urban centers are a landscape of dry and rocky chaparral.

Contrast this scene with Northern California freeways lined with weeds and dead trees and evidence of burnt hillsides from fires - the result of our water conservation effort. Land outside urban areas is in heavy agricultural production - farms, orchards, cattle and dairies - the "breadbasket" of California.

So why are we planning to send water to Southern California? So they can waste it on urban sprawl, on trying to make a desert green, to permit rampant population growth, etc.? If you do not have the resources to sustain this opulent growth, then you should not be expanding. Taking water from Northern California will severely impact our wildlife, our ability to farm and our economy.

Please speak out and stop the twin tunnels.

Joseph Cook

Manteca

I love The Record for all its local news coverage and a closer look at subjects important to those who live here.

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Albert Gomez

Stockton

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The Stanislaus National Forest has some of the most beautiful scenery in the Sierra Nevada. I have hiked, backpacked and ridden my horse in much of the Stanislaus over the past 40 years, and now I feel that access is highly threatened.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service wants to list the yellow-legged frog and the Yosemite toad as endangered species and, in conjunction with that, establish critical habitat for these amphibians. The reason is their declining population due to, they say, much of what humans have been doing, such as introducing trout, which, by the way, have historically been a part of the Sierra.

Listing these amphibians as endangered species will have a real negative effect on recreational use of our Sierra forests. Just in the Emigrant Wilderness alone, about 90 percent of that wilderness area is designated as a critical habitat.

Though this action would have little effect on private lands in the Sierra, it would greatly affect much of our public lands. This action would set aside a large volume of critical habitat for these amphibians in 17 counties.

The public needs to let the Fish and Wildlife Service know that listing of these amphibians is something that need not be done. There is no possible way that any action by the government of restricting the public's access will have any positive effect on these frogs and toads.

Let nature take its course and let humans continue to enjoy our public land here in California.